Friday, September 4, 2015

Today in History for Sept. 4, 2015

Sept. 4, 1774 – New Caledonia was first sighted by
Europeans, during the second voyage of Captain James Cook.

Sept. 4, 1780 - Patriot Francis Marion’s Carolina militia routed Loyalists
at Blue Savannah, South Carolina, and in the process Marion won new recruits to
the Patriot cause. The success of Marion’s militia broke the Loyalist
stronghold on South Carolina east of the PeeDee River and attracted another 60
volunteers to the Patriot cause.

Sept. 4, 1781 – Los Angeles was founded as El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora La
Reina de los Ángeles de Porciúncula (The Village of Our Lady, the Queen of the
Angels of Porziuncola) by 44 Spanish settlers.

Sept. 4, 1824 – During his tour of the United States, the
Marquis de Lafayette visited Hartford, Conn. and Middletown, Conn.

Sept. 4, 1833 - Barney Flaherty answered an ad in "The
New York Sun" and became the first newsboy/paperboy at the age of 10.

Sept. 4, 1861 - Barely three days after being appointed to command at Cape
Girardeau, Missouri, Gen. U.S. Grant set up in business in Cairo, Illinois.
Being the town with the largest concentration of Union forces and the location
of most of the training centers and “camps of instruction” in the Midwest, it
seemed more logical to be on the scene. Polk, meanwhile, was justifying his
invasion of Kentucky with a Confederate army by claiming that the Union was
“concentrating forces” across the river from Columbus, Ky. and that he had just
invaded the state to “protect it.”

Sept. 4, 1861 – During the Civil War, a skirmish was fought at Great Falls,
Md.

Sept. 4, 1861 – During the Civil War, a skirmish was fought at Shelbina, Mo.

Sept. 4-9, 1862 – During the Civil War, Confederate General
Robert E. Lee invaded the North with 50,000 troops and moved toward Harpers
Ferry as part of what is now known as the Maryland Campaign. Union General
George B. McClellan pursued Lee with 90,000 troops.

Sept. 4, 1863 – During the Civil War, Rear Admiral John
Dahlgren began an attack aimed at capturing Charleston. The Confederates
evacuated Battery Wagner and Morris Island, S.C., two days later.

Sept. 4, 1863 – General William Rosecrans’ Union Army of the
Cumberland crossed the Tennessee River today at Bridgeport, Ala., and
Shellmound, Tenn.

Sept. 4, 1864 – During the Civil War, John Hunt Morgan, the
feared Confederate cavalry leader and 39-year-old Alabama native, was shot and
killed during a Union cavalry raid on the town of Greenville, Tenn. At the time
of his death, Morgan was preparing for a raid on Knoxville, Tennessee when,
alerted to his presence, Union cavalry attacked his headquarters at Greenville.
Morgan was shot and killed while trying to join his men.

Sept. 4, 1886 - Geronimo, and the Apache Indians he led,
surrendered in Skeleton Canyon in Arizona to General Nelson Miles. Geronimo and
his band of Apaches were sent to Florida and then to Mount Vernon, Ala. before
eventually ending up at the Comanche and Kiowa reservation near Fort Sill in
the Oklahoma Territory.

Sept. 4, 1905 – The 13th annual session of the Southwest
Alabama Agricultural School in Evergreen, Ala. was scheduled to open. The
school’s president was J.A. Liner.

Sept. 4, 1921 - The first police broadcast was made by radio
station WIL in St. Louis, Mo.

Sept.
4, 1925 - Author Forrest Carter was born in Oxford, Ala.

Sept.
4, 1933 – Former Conecuh County Sheriff A.M. Barfield announced that he would
be a candidate in the upcoming Conecuh County Sheriff’s race, despite rumors
that he had decided to withdraw from the race.

Sept. 4, 1939 - Fredrick D. Richardson Jr. was born in
Nymph, Ala. to Fredrick “Fred” and Helen Richardson. He would become a Mobile
City Councilman in 1997.

Sept. 4, 1940 – Monroe County, Ala. voters voted in a
referendum to become a dry county. At the time, it was one of 24 counties
operating with state liquor stores and licensed sales of alcohol under the
Alabama ABC law.

Sept. 4-21, 1947 - In Florida, Louisianna, Mississipi and
Alabama, 51 people were killed in a hurricane.

Sept. 4, 1950 – Major League Baseball pitcher Doyle
Alexander was born in Cordova, Ala. During his career, he played for the Los
Angeles Dodgers, the Baltimore Orioles, the New York Yankees, the Texas
Rangers, the Atlanta Braves, the San Francisco Giants, the Toronto Blue Jays
and the Detroit Tigers.

Sept. 4, 1951 – Army Pvt. William E. Watson of Wilcox
County, Ala. was killed in action in Korea.

Sept. 4, 1951 - Alabama lawmakers passed legislation
requiring a new look for the state's license plates. Beginning in October 1954,
tags were to carry an image of a heart and the phrase, "Heart of
Dixie," a slogan that had been used for several years by the Alabama State
Chamber of Commerce to promote the state.

Sept. 4, 1953 - The New York Yankees became the first
baseball team to win five consecutive American League championships.

Sept. 4, 1964 – In the first year that preseason high school
football jamborees were allowed in Alabama, Evergreen High School hosted a
jamboree on this date that included Evergreen, Lyeffion, Frisco City and W.S.
Neal. They played four, 10-minutes quarters will teams changing at the end of
each quarter.

Sept. 4, 1968 – Major League Baseball catcher Mike Piazza
was born in Norristown, Pa.

Sept. 4, 1970 – Monroe Academy played its first official
football game, beating South Choctaw, 54-0, in Monroeville, Ala.

Sept. 4, 1978 – The first sighting of “Issie” by a large
group of people occurred when over 20 people saw the massive, snakelike
creature in Lake Ikeda, Japan.

Sept. 4, 1979 – In Lovecraftian fiction, a boater discovered
Henri-Laurent de Marigny clinging desperately to a buoy in the Thames River
with all of his limbs broken and no recollection of how he had spent the last
10 years. He’d last been seen on Oct. 4, 1969 when Blowne Manor, the residence
of Titus Crow on Leonard’s-Walk Heath, was destroyed by a freak windstorm.

Sept. 4, 1985 - The first pictures of the Titanic wreck were
released, after a joint American-French expedition discovered the sunken ship.

Sept. 4, 1986 – Eighteen locations in Greenville, Ala. were
added to the National Register of Historic Places. Those locations included the
Buell-Stallings-Stewart House on Fort Dale Street, the W.S. Blackwell House on
Fort Dale Street; the Butler Chapel A.M.E. Zion Church on Oglesby Street,
Confederate Park, the Dickenson House on South Conecuh Street, the
Evens-McMullan House on Bolling Street, the First Baptist Church of Greenville,
the First Presbyterian Church of Greenville, the Gaston-Perdue House on Cedar
Street, the Graydon House on Cedar Street, the Greenville Public School
Complex, the Hawthorne-Cowart House on Bolling Street, the Hinson House on
Oliver Street, the Lane-Kendrick-Sherling House on Fort Dale Street, the
McMullan-Skinner House on Oliver Street, the Theological Building-A.M.E. Zion
Theological Institute on Conecuh Street, the Ward Nicholson Corner Store on
West Parmer Street and the Wright-Kilgore House on Walnut Street.

Sept. 4, 1986 – National Baseball Hall of Fame first baseman
Hank Greenberg passed away at the age of 75 in Beverly Hills, Calif. During his
career, he played for the Detroit Tigers and Pittsburgh Pirates. He was
inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1956.

Sept. 4, 1987 – Hugh Wilson, in his 13th year as Repton High
School’s head football coach, collected his 100th win at Repton with a 24-12
win over Conecuh County High School in Repton, Ala. That was his 151st win
overall in 25 years as a head football coach.

Sept. 4, 1990 - Barbara Turner, who had been an English
teacher at J.F. Shields High School in Beatrice for the past two years,
picketed on the west side of the Monroe County Courthouse in protest for not
having her employment contract renewed by the county board of education despite
the recommendations of her school principal, trustees, board member, parents
and students. Sam Hollingsworth was superintendent at the time.

Sept. 4, 1992 – The John W. Howard House and Outbuildings on
State Route 10 East in Greenville, Ala. was added to National Register of
Historic Places.

Sept. 4, 1993 - Jim Abbott of the New York Yankees, who was
born without a right hand, pitched a no-hitter.

Sept. 4, 1998 – J.U. Blacksher High School’s football field
was dedicated in honor of former head football coach and principal John M.
Sawyer. The field is now known as the John Sawyer Memorial Field.

Sept. 4, 2002 - The Oakland Athletics won their American
League-record 20th straight game. The A's gave up an 11-run lead during the
game and then won the game on a Scott Hatteberg home run in the bottom of the
ninth inning.

Sept. 4, 2002 - St. Louis manager Tony La Russa got his
1,905th major league win, tying Casey Stengal for eighth place on the all-time
list.

Sept. 4, 2002 - U.S. President Bush promised to seek
Congress' approval for "whatever is necessary" to oust Saddam
Hussein.